1 November 2007 - Speech By Mr Chan Yeng Kit, Chief Executive Officer, Infocomm Development Authority Of Singapore as Guest-Of-Honour at the Official Launch Of The Interactive Digital Centre (IDC) Asia, Temasek Polytechnic.
Speech By Mr Chan Yeng Kit, Chief Executive Officer, Infocomm Development Authority Of Singapore As Guest-Of-Honour At The Official Launch Of The Interactive Digital Centre (IDC) Asia on 1 November 2007, Temasek Polytechnic.
Mr Boo Kheng Hua, Principal & CEO, Temasek Polytechnic
Mr Sridhar Sunkad, Vice President, Business Development, EON Reality Inc
Mr Vincent Ong, Managing Director, IM Innovations Pte Ltd
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen
1. Good morning, everyone.
2. Like you, I am very excited to be here today, because Singapore is welcoming Asia’s first Interactive Digital Centre, in Temasek Polytechnic. This is possible thanks to the successful collaboration amongst key digital media players, including EON Reality, IM Innovations, and of course Temasek Polytechnic.
Singapore - Home to Digital Media Growth
3. This collaboration is significant on many fronts. Firstly, the fact that Singapore has been chosen to be the location for Asia’s first IDC is a strong vote of confidence in our country’s robust and secure infocomm infrastructure. It is also a strong vote of confidence in Singapore’s digital media sector.
4. Digital business revenues have grown from $1.8 billion in 2005 to $2.1 billion last year1. The digital media sector has successfully leveraged Singapore’s high-speed connectivity, which allows seamless transfers of digital goods and services from and through Singapore, to the rest of the world.
5. Indeed, within a few years, when Singapore’s Next-Generation National Broadband Network is ready, businesses can tap on a new gigabit-class network to create even more innovations, and realise greater growth opportunities, that are possible today. Exciting times are ahead in the Digital World. And we welcome companies the likes of EON Reality and IM Innovations, to use Singapore as your base, and the hub for your digital initiatives.
Industry Projects and Capability Development
6. Second, IDC Asia offers a new and accessible capability for the general business community. It allows companies to prototype their product design and use sophisticated visualisation equipment to showcase their products to their users.
7. Backed by Temasek Polytechnic’s excellent track record and competencies in 3D computer graphics, IDC Asia is poised to be a major centre of excellence for 3D visualisation. IDC Asia is another excellent example of successful collaboration between industry and academia in Singapore. Such collaborations also give a boost to the development of Singapore’s infocomm manpower, especially in the field of digital media and entertainment.
Commercialisation and Business Growth
8. Third, for companies in sectors such as engineering, manufacturing and medicine, which require highly-realistic simulations, IDC Asia provides advanced visualisation facilities and state-of-the-art 3D technologies. These allow companies to readily create, configure and demonstrate solutions that interact visually, and train users in a safe and effective way.
9. For example, in the medical field, interactive 3D visualisation can help train personnel to handle complex and expensive medical equipment such as MRI machines. Similarly, in the aerospace field, digital replicas can effectively enhance training in aircraft maintenance.
Digital Media is the Future
10. Digital media is an important sector for Singapore, because of its power to transform the way we work, live, learn and play. It was identified as one of the key sectors in our latest iN2015 infocomm masterplan.
11. Digital media has gone beyond something esoteric used by technical specialists only a couple of decades ago, to being part of our everyday lives. Some of our schools are trying even experimenting with digital media platforms such as blogs, in place of English essay-writing; and holding General Paper classes in Second Life.
12. It is clear that the impact of digital media technologies will be even greater in future. Today’s collaboration in the setting of IDA Asia augurs well for Singapore’s digital media future. Let me congratulate once again, EON Reality, IM Innovations and Temasek Polytechnic, and wish you every success.
13. Thank you.
Note:
1 Digital Media and Entertainment: The Way Forward, Frost and Sullivan 2007
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